Sumatra

soo-ma'tra, an island of the Dutch East Indies. It is crossed by the equator. It is 1,000 miles in length and 260 miles in extreme width. Area, 161,000 square miles. In size it ranks next to its neighbor Borneo. The population, consisting of Malays, Hindus, Chinese, a few Arabs, and certain native tribes, is estimated at 4,000,000. The prevailing religion is Mohammedanism. Many tribes have neither priests nor temples. An ancient people known as the Battaks possesses a peculiar civilization. The priests have a style of writing and a literature of great antiquity all their own. They began at the left hand lower corner and place the letters, one above the other, in a vertical column until the top of the page is reached; then a second column is built up from the bottom. Since 1666 the island has belonged practically to the Dutch. Sumatra resembles Java. The interior is mountainous. Lofty volcanoes rise to a height of 12,000 feet. Interior forests and jungles shelter the elephant, the twohorned rhinoceros, the orang-utan, the tiger, deer, antelope, serpents, and birds of tropical plumage, as well as tribes of men still little known. The coast region yields the Dutch large supplies of timber, gutta-percha, pepper, sago, rice, tobacco, coffee, and sugar. The coast is divided into six residencies, each under a Dutch ruler. An American traveler would reach Sumatra by way of New York, London, and Singapore, or else by way of San Francisco and Manila.